Recently, as I stood in one of the larger book stores
looking at the hundreds of books published for job hunters, with particular
interest to the four shelves dedicated to “how to write a resume,” I
thought, “How many books does one need to cover this single subject?” While there are
probably more than enough books, how to write a great resume
remains a mystery for many.

I’d like to dispel the mystery, and I don’t want
you to have to buy another book to find the answers. Save your money for that
great novel. There are a million books out there worth reading, and life is
short. It’s one of my greatest regrets that I won’t live long enough to read all
the books I want to read.

Know What A Great Resume Is
Supposed To Do

The goal of a great resume is to secure interviews.
It does this by qualifying a candidate for a specific position and enticing the
reader to want meet the candidate in person, to learn more.

Know Your Reader

Successful writers quickly learn to write for the
reader. This is true whether writing an article, a novel, a term paper or a
resume.
While it may be tempting to write a career autobiography, rather than a resume, chances are
that few will be interested in reading it.

What does it mean to “write for the reader?” It
means knowing what your reader needs and wants to know, and providing that
information, and only that information, as early in the document as possible.

When it comes to the resume, the reader is
typically a recruiter, a hiring manager or a potential employer.

What do we know about this reader? Well, we know that his or her time is limited.
The resume reader (hiring manager) typically has hundreds of resumes to sort through,
with a limited amount of time in which to do this,
an important decision to make (“Which of these candidates is qualified enough to
interview?”), and other work to complete.

Resumes typically receive an initial “reading” time
of 15 seconds, or less. Therefore, it's important that your document sell your qualifications
from the moment your reader picks up your document. It should make your reader
feel, “This person understands what I’m trying to achieve. He or she has written
this
document for me.”

In order to write for the reader, you need to
understand what your reader is trying to achieve and be able to make an educated
guess regarding what it is he or she wants to know. If you have a good
understanding of the positions you’re
targeting, and what these positions will entail, then you already have a better sense
of what your reader is hoping to secure than you may, at first, imagine.

For example, you
know that your reader is trying to locate qualified candidates, and you know
that what makes a candidate “qualified” is a certain set of skills, abilities
and personality characteristics (often outlined in an ad). Therefore, any
unrelated information (such as unrelated skills, positions, interests or
hobbies), will have little value to this reader.

You know
that your reader will only give about 15 seconds of attention to your document,
so it would be wise to lead with the most important information in priority. This isn’t a
reader who enjoys a good mystery.

And you know that your reader wants to find a
candidate as soon as possible – so that he or she can get back to the business of
doing business. So a great resume is ready when an opportunity presents itself,
because the opportunity may be fleeting.

So, let’s sit on the side of the resume reader and
pretend that it’s our job to select qualified candidates for the types of
positions being targeted.

To locate potential candidates, we begin by writing an ad
outlining the job’s criteria and posting this ad to the company Website, local
newspaper, and area recruiters.

Here’s an example of an actual
ad:

Leading Financial Services Company
needs exceptional employees that have excellent communication skills,
problem-solving skills and have strong attention to detail.

8 openings for Inbound Customer Service Representatives
Exceptional Benefits Package—to name a few 100%-company paid medical, dental,
and life insurance policies
35 hour work week average

Do you qualify?
Work related experience
High School diploma or GED.

The Customer Service Representatives will provide exceptional customer service
and product information when responding to inquiries from internal and external
sources, whether by phone, e-mail or written correspondence. These sources
include shareholders, brokers, third party administrators, and plan
trustees/administrators. The CSR resolves account problems, performs complex
research and processes transactions in accordance with established guidelines
and within productivity and quality standards. CSRs may assume additional
responsibilities as requested.

In our ad, we outline the key criteria the
potential job candidate will need to meet in order for us to extend an
invitation to interview.

We include information about the position, the
company and the type of candidate we’re hoping to secure. While the ad doesn’t
contain everything about the position, it does tell the reader (job hunter) what
we want and need to know about him or her, and what we believe he or she needs
to know in return.

For example, we indicate that we want a candidate
who can provide “exceptional customer service.” We want a candidate who will be
able to respond to inquiries from “internal and external sources, whether by
phone, e-mail or written correspondence,” with “problem solving” skills and a
“strong attention to detail.” We want a candidate who will be able to “perform
complex research and process transactions in accordance with established
guidelines, productivity and quality standards.”

We also want the candidate to know
that there may be additional responsibilities not outlined in this ad (and the
smart job hunter will inquire regarding what these “additional responsibilities”
will entail at the interview). And finally, we want a candidate who has at least a high
school diploma or GED, and has “work related
experience.”

We post the ad on Friday morning, and arrive on Monday
to find that the ad has been successful: resumes
are coming in. In fact, hundreds have come in. There is now a stack of
resumes on our desk three inches tall.

We grab the first handful with enthusiasm, hoping
that the right candidate will make him or herself known so that we can get this project completed in short order. After all, our supervisor
told us that he only wants us to devote an hour or two to these resumes, as we
have other job responsibilities to complete today. He'd also like to be able to
interview at least ten of the top candidates by the end of the week.

No pressure.

Until we actually read the first document and realize that
this candidate has no related experience. Resume number two is impossible to
follow. Resume number three is from someone looking for a top management
position. Resume number four is from someone with customer service experience,
but there are two typos in the first paragraph alone. Resume number seven
details five jobs in the last nine months. The trashcan beside our desk is
beginning to fill up and the hoped-for “potential candidate” pile is remaining
unenthusiastically thin.

Resume number 22 is from a candidate who wants to
know if he can do the job part-time, “No more than 25 hours per week.” Resume
number 45 is from someone who doesn’t know how to use e-mail but is willing to
learn. Resume number 52 comes in a fancy package and contains a CD-Rom that the
candidate would like us to install in our computer, “A complete PowerPoint
presentation outlining what I have to offer.” It’s trashed immediately. We look
at the clock. It’s been two and a half hours and we’ve screened a hundred
resumes with only a handful of slightly qualified candidate documents in the
“potential candidate” pile. The other work we need to complete today – our
regular work – is starting to stack up as high as the pile of resumes.

Resume number 105 is four pages long. Resume number
112 is a one-page document with text so small we can’t read a single line.
Resume number 143 is from the most qualified candidate yet, but includes
personal information that would be illegal for us to ask at the interview, such
as the candidate’s age, marital status and number of dependents. Not willing
to risk a potential claim of discrimination, we trash it with regret.

We begin to wonder if anyone’s actually read our
ad. We scan the resume documents on our desk more quickly, devoting less and
less time to each.

What is wrong with all of these resumes? Not one of
them is written with the targeted reader in mind.

Bleary-eyed, we pick up resume document number 278
and read, “Skilled and qualified customer service representative offering a
solid four-year background in the financial services industry.” We blink. We
blink again. Is it possible? We read on, “ Experienced in complex research and
transaction processes.” Yes, we think, this is more like it! “Deliver quality
customer service and product information to brokers, shareholders, and
administrators, via phone, e-mail and written correspondence.” Gosh! It’s like
they were reading our mind! “Outstanding communication, organization and problem
solving skills,” “detail-oriented,” “multi-tasking abilities,” “high school
diploma,” and “currently completing Associate of Arts program in
Communications.”

What’s right with this resume? It’s written with
the targeted reader in mind. What makes this resume “great?” The person who
wrote it will have an interview today.

We could skip this whole section if you simply want
to know how to write a great resume – one that will succeed in securing
interviews. But the ultimate purpose of an interview is to secure a job offer
that will present you with the greatest opportunity for success.

Using the information from the previous section,
there’s no question that you should now be able to write an effective resume –
one that will secure an interview (the layout and design may be a little fuzzy,
but I have other articles to cover that, including:
Resume Basics, Resume Formats, and
Free Resume Examples). Yet, if your
resume isn’t written as a true reflection of what YOU have to offer, then
securing interviews is an empty pursuit, particularly as your interviewer
discovers that you lack the qualifications necessary for the position.
Ultimately, the goal of going on interviews is to secure employment.

So when you’re writing your resume, you need to
make it a true reflection of what you have to offer. It can’t be a work of
fiction. It needs to be an accurate portrayal of your skills, abilities,
experiences, and achievements – as these relate to (or are relevant to) the
positions and companies being targeted.

It’s not enough to simply answer the needs of your
reader, particularly if doing so requires you be less than truthful. If I use
the previous ad as an example, I may be tempted to tell the reader that I have
experience in customer service, because I recognize that customer service
experience is a key criterion of the position. But if I don’t have this
experience, and I lie in my resume by stating that I do, even if I’m eventually
hired for the position, my employment can be terminated at any time. I can be
terminated regardless of whether or not I do a great job. I can be terminated
even if I end up being the best customer service representative in the company.
If I lie on my resume, and that lie is discovered, everything I’ve done and said
up to that point becomes suspect, and my employer will have legitimate cause to
terminate my employment.

And if I’m fired for lying on my resume, how am I
going to use this experience to secure my next position? How am I going to
convince anyone that my achievements here were legitimate?

Therefore, it’s important to target positions that
are a good match for your particular skills, abilities, interests, aspirations,
previous achievements and past contributions. This doesn’t mean that you can
only target positions for which you have previous experience, or that you must
meet every criteria in a job ad in order to apply, but that you should target
positions that will be a good match for both you and the potential employer.

As you look through the list of criteria within
each job ad you plan to target, determine how your skills and achievements align
with the needs and requirements of your reader, and identify ways the in which
you can
show these skills in action.

Good luck in your job search!
Sue Campbell Jones,
1st-Writer.com - over 18 years
experience helping clients achieve their career and business goals. Feel free to
e-mail me
with any questions you may have. I'll be glad to help!